Practice

These are times when much is being asked of us. How do we pick ourselves out of the exhaustion and the dullness that often finds root in us and choose to meet the challenges of our days?

How can we be a people who brings kindness to an unkind world, who seeks to need less in a world of overdone greed, to move with ease and contentment in a world driven with discontent, to trust and practice generosity in a world suffocating from anxiety and fear, and finally to live with passion in a world that has retreated into denial and despair?

We get there by practice. If there is anything that yoga has taught me, it is the gift of practice. Change is not instantaneous; it comes through the diligence of daily attention. It comes through effort. It comes through the willingness to sacrifice something easy in the moment for something more beneficial in the long run.


Practice means we choose to tap into resources that will grow our character and fortitude and that will open our hearts into an ever deepening softness. Practice means that we tap into the real and sustaining places of nourishment, not the easy fix. And the irony of this is that the discipline practiced in the moment is also what will ultimately nourish and sustain us.

In the words of Pattabhi Jois: Practice, and all is coming.